Monthly Round-up: January 2019

It's been a while since I posted a monthly update. Mostly because I haven't had much to report.

COMING SOON

I am pleased to announce that my short story 'Cigarette Burns' will be appearing in the 10th Women In Horror issue of THE SIREN'S CALL' e-Zine (issue #43). This is the second year I have appeared in the special WIHM issue of this e-zine.

PUBLICITY

I've really not been pimping myself of late, so nothing to report.

WORK IN PROGRESS

This is where it gets difficult. I'm still trying to get my writing mojo back. I have several works on the go, but struggling with all of them.

The fourth Shara Summers book I have recently done a bit of work on, but since I still don't know what's happening with the third Shara Summers book, and the first two really aren't selling, I am not sure if there is any point in my carrying on with this series.

The collaboration I have been working on with Hubby - a rather sweeping crime thriller set in the 1960s - I have put to one side because I think there are so many problems with it I don't know how to fix it.

And finally, there is the sequel to OUTPOST H311. Which I do want to write. The first book seems to be doing reasonably well, sales-wise. The problem is I haven't finished plotting the sequel yet, and that stage of staring at a blank page wondering where to start is even more overwhelming than usual.

Hopefully by the end of next month I will have something more positive to report. In the meantime, if you've read any of my books I would really appreciate it if you could consider leaving a review. Knowing I have a few readers out there provides more encouragement to a writer than you could ever imagine.

Best Books of 2018

Once more it's time for me to review the books I read in the previous year and blog about the ones I liked the best. My criteria for this is quite simple. I log all the books I read on Goodreads, and those I give a 5-star rating make my 'best books' list.

In 2018 I set a goal of reading 70 books. I fell a bit short of that, managing to complete 68 books before the year ended. However, there was an unusually high number of books I gave a 5-star rating to last year. Seven have made the list. In the order in which I read them, they are:

Ready Player One: Ernest Kline
Everything is Lies: Helen Callaghan
Y is for Yesterday: Sue Grafton
Cross Her Heart: Sarah Pinborough
The Roanoke Girls: Amy Engle
If She Did It: Jessica Treadway
Tombland: CJ Sansom

This list includes one science fiction book, two crime novels (both sort of historical, but one decidedly so), and four psychological thrillers. Further details on each book can be found below.

Ready Player One
The only science fiction book on my list, this is a novel that was recommended to me and when I went to buy it on Kindle I discovered my husband had already bought the Kindle version - we have linked our accounts, so we can each access books bought by the other. Someone else had recommended it to him, completely independently. We both read the book, loved it, recommended it to our D&D group and then when the film came out a couple of months later we all went to see it together.

Set in a dystopian near-future, where everyone escapes their appalling reality by spending all of their time in an idyllic Virtual Reality universe, part of what makes 'Ready Player One' so enjoyable are all the references to 80s pop culture. Anyone who grew up watching films, playing video games and playing D&D in the 1980s will recognise all the references.

The film is quite different from the book, but equally enjoyable. If you saw and loved the film, do yourself a favour and read the book as well.

Everything is Lies
In my review of 'Everything is Lies' I described it as 'a near-perfect psychological thriller'. Helen Callaghan is a member of my writing group, and it's so lovely to be able to watch an author grow and develop in their craft, and eventually produce something of this calibre.

This the first of several psychological thrillers in my list. It's a genre that is in danger of being overexploited. To be able to do one this well, in such a crowded market, is exceptional.

Y is For Yesterday
I was given this book for Christmas in 2017, and I had no idea then that it would prove to be the last Sue Grafton book ever. She sadly passed away not long after, and her family announced they would not be finishing the series on her behalf.

I've been reading the Kinsey Millhone series for decades, and I've enjoyed every single one of them. Because I had this one in hardback, therefore making it difficult to carry around with me, I read it when I was confined at home recuperating from surgery in February 2018. The fact that it was Kinsey Milhone's last case added extra poignancy, but it was an outstanding story. I have a great deal of admiration for a writer who had 25 books in the same series published, and there was never any drop in quality. Ms Grafton left us too soon, and she is greatly missed.

Cross Her Heart
Sarah Pinborough made my list last year with 'Behind Her Eyes'. This year I read the next psychological thriller she brought out, and while the twist ending is perhaps not as legendary as BHE, this is still an excellently written novel that had me gripped to the end.

The Roanoke Girls
Everyone had been raving about this book, so I thought it was about time I got around to reading it. It's a psychological thriller about a family that produces extraordinarily beautiful young women, but there's a dark secret running through it.

It's not exactly a happy read, but it stayed with me for a long time after I read it, and it's rare for books to do that. You can read my review on Goodreads here.

If she Did It
Yet another psychological thriller, this is a story told from the point of view of Hanna, mother of two daughters. Three years on from a brutal attack that killed her husband and left her disfigured, Hanna is still trying to pick up the pieces of her shattered life. Her youngest daughter's boyfriend was arrested and found guilty of the attack. Hanna can't remember exactly what happened the night of the attack, but is fixated with finding out. Because she finds herself entertaining the unthinkable suspicion that her daughter was somehow involved.

Again, this is a somewhat disturbing read, but it had me gripped. Find my full review here.

Tombland
The latest book in the Matthew Shardlake series is the most epic yet - spanning 850 pages and dealing with the peasants' revolt in Norwich in 1549.

I really hope that this isn't the last Shardlake book, but I understand that CJ Sansom has cancer. This illness has taken far too many fine writers from us in recent years.

This concludes my list of recommended reads for 2018 - those books that I thought stood out above all the rest I read throughout the year. This year, I've once again set the bar at reading 70 books. I have high hopes that I will make my target this year.

Monthly Review: February 2018

On 1 February, I went in for surgery.

Since then I've been at home recovering, so February is pretty much a write-off. However, it's been very cold while I've been off, so it's not been a bad time to be stuck indoors. And by the time I go back to work, which I hope will be next week (pending doctor approval) it will be daylight when I leave the house.

That said, there are a few things to report this month.

OUT NOW/COMING SOON

I'm pleased to announce that my story 'Morgan's Father' is included in the Women in Horror edition of the SIREN'S CALL e-zine. This issue is completely free to download as a PDF and is chock full of horror stories by women, so download your copy now.

In other news, we don't yet have a release date for OUTPOST H311, but the onus is on me at the moment since I've had the edits back and I'm working through them. And it's taking rather longer than I was expecting. Partly that's due to being on sick leave. For the first two weeks following surgery I couldn't really do much except lie about reading or watching TV. No concentration for anything else. However, this week I've been making progress with the edits, so hopefully there'll be more news on this next month.

PUBLICITY

I contributed to Mark West's Stephen King mixtape, which appeared on his blog on 26 February. This was a post including a long list of writers talking briefly about their favourite King story. I chose 'The Breathing Method'.

WORK IN PROGRESS

I haven't worked on any WIPs for a while, what with surgery getting in the way and all. So the current status is unchanged. There are two current works in progress:

A WHITER SHADE OF PAIN: a crime thriller set in 1967 which is a collaboration with my husband. We plotted the book together, then I wrote Draft 1 and he started on Draft 2. The latter isn't finished yet, but I've taken it back to make further changes to the amended chapters. So I suppose it's currently on Draft 2.5.

DEADLY SUMMER is the fourth Shara Summers novel, which takes my intrepid sleuth to New York City when she gets a job in a US soap opera. I am about a third of the way through the first draft. I halted work on this when I started writing OUTPOST H311, and I haven't got back to it yet.

That's all to report this month. I anticipate that by the end of next month, spring will have sprung. But you can never tell, with British weather.

Monthly Review: January 2018

I really hate January. It has no redeeming features. It's dark, cold and wet, everyone is broke after Christmas, there is nothing to look forward to and as I never see daylight during the working week it's the month my SAD seems to hit the hardest so I spend most of it feeling depressed.

Hence, I am always glad to see the back of it. Happily, we are now out of January and there are a few things to look forward to in the coming months as there is news to report.

COMING SOON:

I am pleased to announce that my previously-published story "Morgan's Father" (most recently available in the collection SOUL SCREAMS) is to be published in the forthcoming 'Women in Horror' edition of the ezine SIREN'S CALL.

My new horror novel OUTPOST H311 is currently with the editor, and will be released later this year from KGHH publishing. I will let you know when I have more news regarding release date.

PUBLICITY:

I've been a bit quiet on this front of late, and there's nothing to report at the moment, but there are a couple of things I've been working on and I hope to have something to report soon.

WORK IN PROGRESS:

With the horror novel finished I've been trying to figure out what to work on next. I'm back at work on the collaboration with Hubby, which has been a somewhat long-running project. It's a crime thriller set in 1967, about a young woman with a dream to play bass in a band, who gets caught up in the heady world of London gangs and the rising music scene when she searches for a friend who's disappeared.

The fourth Shara Summers novel is about a third of the way through draft 1, but I have not done any work on it for 12 months. I am still in two minds as to whether to carry on with this series. I enjoy writing it, but it's not selling, and is there any point in carrying on with a series people don't want to read?

As we move into February and the days start to get lighter, things start to look brighter. Join me again at the end of this month to see what it had in store!

Monthly Round-up: January 2017

I'm a bit late with this round-up since it's now 1 February. So how have I been doing in the first month of this year? Let's see...

OUT NOW

Nothing new out, but I'll take this opportunity to pimp the existing works.

Horror
The Whispering Death
Suffer The Children

Crime (Contemporary Amateur Sleuth)
Death Scene
Dead Cool

Short Story Collection
Soul Screams

PUBLICITY

No guest blog posts to report. However, I am running a Goodreads Giveaway for THE WHISPERING DEATH for February, with two free paperback copies of the book to giveaway. You can enter here. Please note this is for UK entrants only, due to postage costs. Please promote the giveaway if you are able to - I am hoping to raise awareness of the book and perhaps get a few more reviews. There will be more giveaways over the next few months so watch this space.

WORK IN PROGRESS

Work has started on a new horror novel. Since this one is to be delivered to KGHH Publishing this year I am pressing on with it, and I have achieved nearly 10,000 words in the first month of the year. It is set in the Arctic, and it has the title OUTPOST H311.

Meanwhile the fourth Shara Summers novel is also a work in progress.

Plenty to keep me busy, then. See you at the end of February!

Monthly Round-up: July 2014

And I'm back for a look at what's been going on writing-wise in my world for the past month.

COMING SOON:

Edits continue apace on both DEATH SCENE and DEAD COOL - in fact these have been keeping me extremely busy for the last few weeks. DEAD COOL is currently at a more advanced stage than DEATH SCENE.

It is looking likely at this stage that DEATH SCENE will have a mid-September release, and DEAD COOL will follow a month later. The good news is, pre-orders will be able to be placed and logged ahead of release date. The bad news is, I think this facility is only available to people in the US & Canada. My British fans are going to have to hold off until Autumn.

PROMOTIONAL NEWS:

I've been rather busy making guest appearances over the Internet over the past month. Here is a list of where you can find me, along with the links.

16 June - Susan A Royal (interview & blog swap)
17 June - Heather Fraser Brainerd & David Fraser (interview)
24 June - Heather Greenis (guest post)
25 June - The Poet's Fire (interview)
8 July - Helena Fairfax (guest post)
10 July - Mary Waibel (interview)

Convention-wise, I went to the Theakstons Old Peculier crime writing festival in Harrogate earlier this month. I met up with a lot of other crime writers, and handed out postcards with the cover image of DEATH SCENE on. I also left a pile of them on the book swap table, where everyone seemed to be leaving their promotional cards, and I was happy to note that they all disappeared. Whether or not this interest will manifest into sales I don't know, but I am happy that the cover is attracting people's interest. That's the first step, anyway.

Next up is the Nineworlds Geekfest convention in London in August, where the writing group is running a workshop of writing exercises designed to beat writers' block, and I will be participating in a panel on 'Noir' fiction in all its forms.

WORK IN PROGRESS:

I've actually got three, and they are all at a bit of an impasse.

1) The Collaboration:
This is the 1960s crime thriller I am working on with hubby. We worked on the plotting together, and I have finished the first draft, which I have since passed to him to read. He is presently working on plot holes that we need to work out how to fix.

2) The horror novel:
I believed this one to be finished, and earlier in the year I was sending it out. But identical comments were coming back with the rejections, which made me realise it needs another polish. I have yet to sit down and redraft it.

3) The third Shara book:
This began life a number of years ago as the second Shara book, and lurched to a halt because I had not plotted it properly. I abandoned it and started writing the novel that would eventually become DEAD COOL. Recently I've hauled it out in an attempt to dust it off and give it another go. But I need to fix the plot problems first, and take into account the fact that Shara starts this novel in a different place than she original did, after the events of DEAD COOL. It has been calling out to me to get back to it. But I know that if I start writing it again without working out the plot problems first, I'm going to stall in the same place I did the first time around. I will say that it's not that I don't know who the murderer is, because I do. It's the middle bit that's giving me problems with this one, and the logistics behind how Shara solves the murder.

I am ashamed to say that in spite of having three works on the go, I haven't done much work on any of them for nearly three weeks. My excuse is that having two books to edit has been keeping me busy. But that's not a very good excuse.

I am setting a pledge to myself. By the time I come to you with August's update, I must have made progress on at least one of these WIPs.

Till next time, then...

Monthly Round-Up: June 2014

In an attempt to try and be more diligent in my writerly blogs - which are technically supposed to happen once a week, on Wednesdays (sorry, I'm a day late) - I am endeavouring to make the round-up post a monthly feature.  This will be a regular update on forthcoming releases, works in progress and promotional appearances.  Without further ado, here is the news for this month.

COMING SOON:

The MUI re-release of DEATH SCENE is at line edit stage so progressing well. Still no confirmed release date, but likely to be end of June.  Watch this space for more news.

Edits on DEAD COOL are also progressing.  This is scheduled for release in the Autumn, so it's likely to be September/October time.  My editor has been enthusing about what a good read it is, so I am feeling encouraged.

PROMOTIONAL NEWS:

I've been busy with the publicity train this month, with two guest appearances in the first half of June, and I'm talking about DEATH SCENE and my writing process in both.  Marsha R West features me as her Tuesday author chat and I'm also chatting to fellow crime writer Joan C Curtis this week on her Joan Says blog.  Joan and I are clearly on the same wavelength - not only do we both write crime, but we have both got the same idea for blog names (since mine began life as Sara Says).

Next month I will also be attending the Theakstons Crime & Mystery Conference at Harrogate, Yorkshire, to hang out with other crime writers.

WORK IN PROGRESS:

I am nearing the end of the first draft of the 1960s crime thriller.  As this is a collaboration with my husband, I will be handing it to him once the first draft is done, for him to do some work on it.  We've never collaborated on a project before and this one is in an early stage, so it will be a bit of a learning curve for both of us.

And the third Shara book is currently demanding quite loudly to be written.  So I would like to get started on that soon.

That's about it for this month.  Further updates to come in July!

The End In Sight

I got the early train into London this morning for an early-morning Starbucks writing session - something I have not done in a while, it must be said.  In fact looking at my writing log made me realise the last writing session was dated 16 April - over a month ago.  I will say at this point I am rather anal about logging my writing sessions, noting word count and date of every one.  It helps me keep track of my monthly word count, and also how long it takes me to finish each draft.  But it also makes me aware of how long it's been since the last session.

Why the gap?  The end of April and beginning of May was manically busy in the day job, and I was also working on edits for both DEATH SCENE and DEAD COOL, which made it hard for me to get my head around working on the WIP as well.  And then I was away for two weeks.  I did actually take the Netbook away with me, with the idea that if it was raining I might get some time to sit in the hotel room and write, but well...the weather was glorious and the writing didn't happen.

Anyway.  Now I am back home again and trying to get back into my usual routine, including the early-morning writing sessions.  The current work in progress is the 1960s crime thriller, and this morning was a good session.  I've been wrestling with the climax of this one, but now I feel that the end is in sight.  The novel still needs a great deal of work - I am not deluding myself about that.  But I am nearing the end of the first draft.  And I've always seen the first draft as putting the scaffolding in place.  Once you've got that, you can start the real building work.

The main issue with this novel will be research.  It's set in 1967, and spans San Francisco, London and Vietnam.  This is not an era I was alive to witness, but there are plenty of people around who were, and they'll notice if I get it wrong.  The parts of the novel set in Vietnam - which is effectively the final section of the story - is proving particularly tricky.  This was a very emotive point in history.  In particular I want to know what Long Binh looked like in 1967.

Research has never been my strong point, and I've never let a mere thing like getting the facts right stop me from getting stuck into the first draft.  Of course, this generally means a great deal of changes between the first draft and future drafts.  Fortunately, the Internet has made doing research a great deal easier than it used to be.  A quick search has revealed that there are a lot of personal accounts and photos from soldiers who lived through the Vietnam war out there in the public domain, and careful research will help me ensure I get it right.

For me, the most important thing is to get to the end of draft 1.  I'm not there yet with this WIP.  But I can just glimpse the light at the end of the long tunnel.

After that, the real work starts.  Doing the research, getting the facts right, sorting out the plot holes, working out what's not working and what's not in the novel that should be.  But all that will come later.  For now, I'm focusing on getting to the end.  And I feel like I'm almost there.

Plotting

On the crime panel at Sci Fi Weekender, I found myself - quite literally - between two opposing views on plotting.  At one end of the table was a writer who was evangelical about the importance of plotting.  At the other end of the table was a writer who says she never plots and believes she would lose interest in writing about her characters if she knew what was going to happen to them next.  I was sitting in the middle.

I was struck by how neatly this set up demonstrated opposing views on plotting.  Some writers are plotters, some are 'seat of pantsers', but rarely have I seen two extremes demonstrated so neatly on the same panel.   And it inspired me to come up with this post.

I am on the side of the plotters, I have to say.  But it hasn't always been that way, and it has been my own experience that has brought me to this way of thinking.

When I started writing SUFFER THE CHILDREN, it was based on a short story called "Kiddiwinks".  The story was basically about a group of children telling scary stories to each other about the witch that allegedly lives in the haunted house.  They dare each other to go in and discover that it is, indeed, occupied by a sinister old woman.  Who, they learn too late, eats children.  The writing group encouraged me to turn this short story into a novel, and the premise behind SUFFER THE CHILDREN was born.

When I began the novel I knew the monster was to be a mythological creature, and that the main characters would have to defeat the creature.  What I didn't know at the time was how they were going to do that.  I began the first draft, thinking that ideas would come to me as I went along.  I ended up writing half the novel, and then got stuck.  I went back to the beginning, and re-wrote the first half, but I was still stuck at the same point.  My characters were floundering around saying that they had to defeat this evil creature, but they had no idea how to do it, and neither did I.  I put the novel away, for a good five years - writing short stories in the mean time.  I dreaded going back to it.  I had no idea how I was going to write myself out of the hole I'd dug for myself.

But I wanted to finish the novel, and eventually I bit the bullet and realised I had to work out how it was going to end.  So I went back to the beginning and wrote a three-page summary of the whole novel.  From there I took that summary and broke it down into a chapter by chapter plan, from beginning to end.

At that point, I went back and started the novel over.  And lo and behold I got to the end of the first draft.

I have used this technique for writing ever since.  I write the plot summary first - usually it runs to three pages.  I break that down into a chapter by chapter outline.  Only then do I start writing the first draft.

Some people baulk at such a regimented plan, but this is now the only way I can write a novel.  It means that every time I sit down for a writing session, I review what I wrote last time, and I look at my chapter plan and I know what's going to happen next.  Sometimes my chapter plan is quite brief - it might say, for instance, that in chapter 10 my amateur sleuth has to discover X about this character, which turns out to be a vital clue.  But how she's going to discover this piece of information I still have to think about when I sit down to write the chapter.

This doesn't mean that things always go to plan.  Writing the first draft of DEAD COOL I was surprised to discover about three quarters of the way through the first draft that the killer was not who I initially thought it was.  But knowing the identity of the real killer suddenly made a lot of things in the plot that hadn't been making sense click into place, and all I actually had to do to correct the second draft was to plant a couple of extra clues and rewrite a few scenes with different characters.  And of course it did change the ending a bit.

If you're a pantser and not a plotter, I am not disrespecting the way you work.  Everyone has to find the system that works for them.  But I will say, as a reader, I can tell when a book has not been plotted.  Generally the book will start off with the characters heading in a certain direction, and suddenly they'll lurch off and head in a completely different direction. Some people might say that they enjoy unexpected twists like this, but I tend to find them a bit off-putting.  But this is just me.  On the whole, I don't like surprises.

Perhaps we can liken writing a novel to taking a journey.  A plotter takes the GPS, and the map.  They've studied the route beforehand, they know where they are going and how they are going to get there.  There are no surprises.  This is the way I work.  Occasionally I might take a slightly different road than the GPS suggests, because instinct suggests there's a better way, but only if I'm confident that I'm still going to end up in the same place.

A pantser, on the other hand, will get in the car and start driving.  For them, it's about the journey, not the destination.  They will get lost, they will arrive very late, they might end up someplace completely unexpected, but they enjoy the journey and not knowing what's around the next corner.
Plotting and pantsing is reflected in reading preferences, too.  I much prefer to read books that are plot driven, with a clear beginning, middle and end.  Readers who are more fond of character-driven books and 'surprises' are going to be more fond of writers who don't plot.  And I suspect such readers may not get on very well with my books - they might consider them too predictable.

This is one of those issues that always causes lively debate - there's no right or wrong answer, it's entirely down to personal preference.  Whether you're a reader, or a writer, where do you stand?

Commercial Break

As we settle into 2014 I've been rather busy with promotional stuff, so I thought it was appropriate for a general update on what I've been up to of late.

Firstly, a round-up of guest appearances on the Internet for 2014. At the end of January, I featured on Chris Weigand's Palace of Twelve Pillars blog, talking about how I was inspired to create my amateur sleuth Shara Summers. Earlier this month I visited Janie Franz's blog Anasazi Dreams, talking about ambition and discipline being the tools of a writer. And most recently I've visited Helena Fairfax's blog, where we've been reminiscing about childhood holidays in Blackpool.

All of this is an endeavour to drum up interest in the Shara Summers series, as the first two books are being released by MuseItUp this year. The first, DEATH SCENE, is a re-release. The previous version is no longer available, but the re-release will be out in the summer. If you haven't been introduced to Shara yet, this is the one to start with. And if you've already read DEATH SCENE, a new publisher means new round of edits, so this version will be slightly different than the first.

If you enjoy meeting Shara in the first book, the second book in the series, DEAD COOL, will be released in Autumn so you won't have to wait too long to catch up with her again.

Thus far, I don't have definitive release dates or covers for either book. But you'll be the first to know when I do, so watch this space.  In the meantime, if you want a sneak peek, there's a blurb about each on the 'Coming Soon' page on my website.

And finally, if your tastes run to darker fiction, I've got some back listed horror titles that might be to your liking. SUFFER THE CHILDREN - available on the Kindle (US and UK) - is a supernatural horror novel with its roots based in mythology. And SOUL SCREAMS - available in print and ebook - is a collection of short horror stories about "that inner scream no one can hear but you". It's recently received some rather positive reviews on Goodreads, and if creepy stories are your thing, it might be right up your alley.

All this is why I've not had much time for the blog recently.  But of course that's a poor excuse, and I hope that from now on I can improve on this year's track record.

If you've recently discovered this blog, I bid you welcome and I hope you'll stick around for a while.  If you've been following from the beginning, I'd like to say thank you for bearing with me - your support means a lot.  It's going to be a busy year for me, writing-wise, and I hope you'll join me for the ride.

The Shara Summers Series

When I started shopping DEAD COOL to publishers, I made mention of the fact that it was the second book in a series and that the first, though published, was due to have rights revert back to me fairly soon.  This was entirely true, but I had no idea whether or not the information would help.  I didn't think, at the time, that any publisher would be interested in taking on a book that was effectively a back list title.  In fact I'd already started thinking about possibly self-publishing DEATH SCENE when the rights came back.  What else was I going to do with it?

And then when MuseItUp Publishing took on DEAD COOL they also expressed interest in the first book in the series when the rights became available.

And so it is that DEATH SCENE, though not currently available, will be released by MuseItUp later this year.  Before DEAD COOL, as it happens.

DEATH SCENE is to be released Spring/Summer (which I gather can mean any time between March and August), with DEAD COOL scheduled for release in Autumn (September-November).  Once I have a better idea of dates, I will of course publicise this.

The irony in all this is that the when I was shopping DEAD COOL around to publishers, at the same time as my horror novel, the amateur sleuth novel was the one I was least confident about.  And yet, in the end, not only did I get a request for a full manuscript from every single publisher I sent the first three chapters to, in the end it got picked up first.  Thus proving that sometimes writers get far too close to their own work to be able to offer a balanced viewpoint.

So the Shara Summers books are now officially a series.  And with books 1 and 2 having a home together, I'm seriously thinking about writing book 3.

Up to now Shara's been largely ignored.  Let's hope that with her first two adventures being released into the wide world this year, she'll finally start to make an impact.  I think there's life in the old girl yet.

The Writing Process Blog Hop

I’m a bit late to this party.  I was tagged by Christopher Mannino earlier this month to participate in a blog hop on the writing process.

Actually ‘blog hop’ is a bit of a misnomer for this one - it’s more a blog chain, as the three people you tag then have to take the same questions to their own blog.

Hence, here is my shout-out to Christopher – you can learn more about him on his blog and his website.

And here are my answers to the four questions.

1) What am I working on?

I’m working on a historical crime thriller that I am collaborating on with my husband.  It’s set in the 1960s, and is about a young woman who aspires to be a bass player, searching for her friend who’s disappeared whilst exploring the vibrant London music scene of the era.

2) How does my work differ from others of its genre?

I love strong women, and am drawn to writing about independent-minded female characters.  My amateur sleuths always have something a little bit different about them.  My forthcoming release with MuseItUp, DEAD COOL, features a Canadian actress who lives in London and notices cultural differences here and there (while solving murders, of course).  In the current work in progress my heroine, Alex, comes to London because she longs to join a band and she is learning to play bass guitar, but it is set in 1967 and she encounters a lot of prejudice – there weren’t too many women bass players in those days.

I like satisfactory endings, but I’m not fond of ‘happy ever after’.  To me, an ending must resolve the plot satisfactorily and tie up all relevant loose ends, but things don’t always go the way my characters want them to, and sometimes they have to deal with the consequences of their actions or simply that life isn’t always fair.

3) Why do I write what I do?

My writing is often cathartic.  Sometimes the only way I can deal with unpleasant or negative feelings is to write about them.  Which is generally why my stories tend to be quite dark.  Happy feelings I don’t write about because I try to hold on to them.  It’s only the bad feelings I want to exorcise, by putting them into my writing.

4) How does my writing process work?

I tend to spend a lot of time on plotting before I start working on a novel.  I’ve learned the hard way that’s the best way for me to work – I’ve got too many half-finished novels languishing in drawers because I couldn’t figure out how they were going to end.

I will try and work out a rough outline of the plot first, and then I will take this and break it down further into a chapter-by-chapter outline before I start writing chapter 1.  This plan is not set in stone - as I start to write the first draft I will often find the characters will take me places I hadn’t thought about in the plot outline, but it means when I sit down to write, I’ve got a good idea about what happens next, and it makes it easier to get to the end of draft 1.  Once draft 1 is done, I go back over the novel and work on as many revisions as it takes before it’s done.  I’m a big believer of ‘fixing it in the rewrite’.  It’s OK for the early drafts to be rubbish.  There’s always room to sort out those plot holes or tighten up that dialogue in the next draft.

I have a day job, and a long commute into London to get to it, so finding time to write can often be a challenge.  I find my most productive sessions are done on my NetBook, in coffee shops, before work.  Sometimes I get up at 5:30am and take the early train in to London so I can get an hour of writing in before heading to the office.  I never considered myself a morning person, and I hate setting the alarm so early, but it works for me so I stick with it.

Here are my three tagged authors, who will be picking up the baton over the next couple of weeks.  Do go and check them out.

1. Janie Franz (http://janiefranz.fourfour.com/home)
2. Suzanne de Montigny (www.suzannedemontigny.com)
3. Rosemary Morris (http://www.rosemarymorris.blogspot.co.uk/

A Home for Shara Summers

I'm very pleased to be able to announce that the second novel in my amateur sleuth series has found a home with MuseItUp Publishing.

The first book the series, DEATH SCENE, introduced my amateur sleuth - Canadian actress Shara Summers, summoned back to England because of a family crisis.  One of the things I wanted to explore in the series was the concept of cultural alienation.  Shara makes observations throughout about things that are different in England, compared to her home in Toronto.

It proved a tough sell.  One of the most common reason for rejection for both books was the fact that my contemporary amateur sleuth was not based in America.  I got told many times over that such things do not sell in America, and therefore there was no market for the book.  Americans like books set in America, apparently, or historical English mysteries featuring people like Miss Marple or Sherlock Holmes.

When Lyrical Press took the first book I started writing the second.  Officially titled DEAD COOL, my working title for it was "The Case of the Defenestrated Rock Star".  Mostly because "defenestrated" is such a great word, and how often do you get the opportunity to use it in a sentence?
However, by the time LPI released DEATH SCENE, they'd stopped taking mysteries and were focusing on romance and erotica, so I knew there was no market with them for the sequel.  And so Shara Summers was adrift, without a publisher.

Not to mention that by the time I finished the third draft of the second book, I'd developed some serious insecurities about it.  You know how it goes.  It's rubbish.  It's full of plot holes that can't be fixed.  Why am I deluding myself that I'm trying to be writer?  I crawled into a hole with the book and didn't want to come out again.

Then on holiday in France a couple of years ago, I met a retired London Metropolitan Police copper who used to be on the Murder Squad, and I asked him if he would read my crime book, to pick up any glaring procedural errors.  He agreed.  When he came back to me, he told me he'd really enjoyed it.  It was a good holiday read, he said.  And he hadn't picked up any major problems with my procedurals.

Which is exactly what I need to hear, and it gave me the confidence to finish the book.  Said retired copper will be getting a mention in the credits, but I owe him a lot more than that.

Now I am delighted that my Canadian amateur sleuth has come home to Canadian publishers.  No release date has yet been set, but it is likely to be the latter half of 2014.

I am very much looking forward to working with my new publishers, on Shara's continuing journey.  I hope you will come along with me for the ride.

On A Roll

With two finished novels out on sub, it was time to begin in earnest a new project.

I've mentioned in passing a collaboration with Hubby. Who, it has to be said, is not a writer. However, after 30 years of running Dungeons & Dragons games, he's become very good at plotting - especially with our group, who frequently decide to go off and do something that's not actually in the module, which means he often has to do some spontaneous plotting to keep the game going.

The WIP is a crime thriller set in the late 1960s, and is about a young woman with aspirations to be a rock musician. The novel takes her from California and the Monterey pop festival in 1967 to the emerging and influential music scene in London. On the way she gets mixed up with gangland London, in a search for a friend who's gone missing.

This project is in its early stages.  Hubby and I have been working together on the plot outline, and I've been doing the writing thus far. Though I am relying on his expertise on references to bands and songs of the late 60s, and what make of guitar bands of the time would be playing, as he knows a lot more about this than I do.

Thus far I've been struggling with the first draft. The first 20,000 words took months to write, and I was struggling to find the voice of the main character.

But suddenly, I've found the story and the character, and the novel has become much easier to write.  In the last two weeks I have written as many words as I did in September and October combined.

The project is in its early stages, and I am reluctant to say too much about it as anything can happen between now and the end of the book. But thus far it's going well. I am on a roll.

Here's hoping it continues.

Sara Paretsky, Shara Summers and Feminism

I read a great many books - on average, just over one a week.  I have read so many books that I find it impossible to pick out just one favourite.

I do, however, have several favourite authors.  Authors whose books I constantly go back to, and it feels like visiting an old friend.  Books which affect me in such a way I have to choose carefully what I read following them, because everything else will just seem inferior.

One such author is Sara Paretsky.  I discovered her V I Warshawski series in the early 1990s, back when I was first aware of enthusiastically embracing feminism.  It was a revelation.  Here for the first time I encountered a heroine who represented everything I wanted to be.  A fiercely independent woman who was brave, resourceful, unafraid to speak her mind and without need of a man to define her existence.  Single and childless, V I is sarcastic, blunt and able to hold her own in a fight.  I thought then, and still think now, that she is a fantastic role model for young women.

And even in the 21st century, there are few heroines like her.  Sue Grafton has a similar independent minded, single and childless heroine in Kinsey Milhone.   Kathy Reichs, another writer I admire, has a strong woman in Temperance Brennan, but unlike V I Tempe is a mother, and does occasionally need rescuing by men.

Not everyone shares my adoration of V I, as reviews on Goodreads and Amazon testify.  Some readers - among them women, I was surprised to note - find her too unlikeable.  They don't like her sarcasm and confrontational manner.

I do not deny that my amateur sleuth Shara Summers was inspired by V I Warshawski.  When I set out to write a crime series, I wanted a heroine like V I - someone courageous and independent minded, who was not afraid to speak her mind.  But I wasn't brave enough to write a police procedural, so I went for an amateur sleuth.  And in many ways Shara is very different from V I.  She's not as brave.  She's not the champion of the underdog the way that V I is.  And she does occasionally get rescued by men.  And because I'm just not as good a writer as Sara Paretsky, sometimes I don't pull off what I'm trying to do.  Maybe Shara just comes across sometimes as being bitchy instead of courageous.

It's also clear that Shara is not everyone's cup of tea.  DEATH SCENE racked up 31 rejections before it was published by Lyrical Press.  One of the most common reasons for the book being rejected was the character not being likeable enough to take through a series.

The revelation that not everyone loves V I Warshawski - because I've been enthusiastically recommending these books to everyone for the last 20 years - was a bit of a surprise, and I've recently been ruminating on that.  V I is sarcastic, snarky, and blunt.  She can be downright rude - especially to arrogant and patronising men.  In the early books, which seem to be set in the early 1980s, V I is unusual in being a woman P I, and she encounters a hostile reaction to this by many people.  Especially men.

Women are not supposed to embody these qualities.  Even in these times, they are generally expected to be soft, caring and nurturing, and I think this is the main reason that women who don't possess these qualities are regarded with suspicion.  They are considered to be not 'normal' women.

I like the fact that V I is snarky, blunt and rude.  But there are some people out there who might say I embody similar qualities.  And the same people who wouldn't like V I for these qualities probably don't like me much, either.

I must confess that now I'm the wrong side of 40 I've got to a point in life where I don't really care if people don't like me for being me.  As a woman gamer, role-player, and horror writer, I've encountered a number of men over the years who don't know what to make of me.  The fact that I'm deliberately childless also causes resentment in certain people - it's surprising (and depressing) how many people, even in this day and age, who assume that all women want children and any who don't are instantly labelled as being abnormal and not to be trusted.

None of these things matter that much to me these days, but I'm pretty sure that the people that fall into the aforementioned categories are not my target readership.

For the length of time that human beings have existed on this planet, we've proved to be depressingly stagnant in moving on with our thinking.  I will go on recommending Sara Paretsky's books to everyone I have a conversation about crime books with - particularly women.  I would like every young women to read at least one V I Warshawski book.  For every one who comes away thinking, "this is the sort of woman I want to be," then a battle will be won.

There's a long way to go before we win the war, though.

Riding the Rejection Train

I am currently in the position of having two completed manuscripts and no publisher.  One is a horror novel, the other is the second book in the series about amateur sleuth Shara Summers.

I've started submitting these two and I get a strange feeling of deja vu.  Between 2007 and 2009 I also had two novels to submit - one horror (SUFFER THE CHILDREN) and one crime (DEATH SCENE), the first Shara Summers book.  Then Lyrical accepted SUFFER THE CHILDREN, followed by DEATH SCENE, and the rest is history.

But now I find myself riding the submission/rejection train again, for the first time in quite a while.  Though actually I think 'rejection roundabout' is a better metaphor.  You feel like you're going round and round in a circle.

I can categorically say it doesn't get easier.  I've only just started this journey again, with each novel being sent out to only one publisher so far.  Unfortunately it happened that the responses arrived at the same time, in spite one novel being sent out quite a while before the other.  The rejection for the crime novel arrived on Monday; the rejection email for the horror novel on Tuesday.  So it's not been a good week.

Before I was published I held this fantastical idea that being published would make it all better.  That once I had one novel accepted, everything else I wrote would automatically get accepted, and I would never again worry that what I was writing wasn't good enough.  But that's not the way it works.  Just because someone accepts one novel doesn't necessarily mean they - or anyone else for that matter - will like everything else you write.  And you don't stop with the writer insecurities.  Instead of fearing I'll never be published, now I fear that the first two novels got published as a bit of a fluke, my creativity is spent and I'll never write anything of publishable quality again.

But the same rules apply to all writers, no matter how much or how little experience you have.  When the rejections come, you have to pick yourself up, dust yourself off and try again.  So I've crossed the first names off the submission list for these two manuscripts, and getting ready to go down the list.

For the time being, though, I'm still smarting from the double whammy of being rejected twice in two days.  I'll be over here in the corner for a while, quietly whimpering.

Shara Returns

It's been 18 months since I finished the third draft of the second Shara Summers novel, entitled DEAD COOL. I haven't touched it since then.

Why? I got discouraged. Feedback I had from beta readers suggested there was a lot of work still to do on it. So much so, I didn't know where to begin.

Some writers refuse to listen to criticism. Sometimes I think I have the opposite problem. I listen to too much criticism. Someone says to me, "I don't think this plot is working", I look at it and think, "they're probably right". But then I have no ideas for a new plot so I just stop working on the story. I have had a few people say, "I don't like your amateur sleuth; she's not a strong enough character to take through a series". This triggers a little voice in my head that insists there's no point in carrying on with any more books about this character because no one likes her.

All this effectively meant I got so discouraged about writing about Shara I couldn't carry on with the series. A book I got three drafts into has been languishing on the PC ever since.

Two significant things happened since then. First, my NetBook died about a week after the crit session I had for this manuscript. I had been using said NetBook to make copious notes about what my critiquers were saying. I didn't back this up anywhere. When the NetBook died, this file was lost in the ether forever. Given that this was some time ago, I no longer have a clear memory of what I was told I needed to fix.

Second, I have recently had feedback from someone else I gave the manuscript to - a retired copper who used to work for the Metropolitan Police Murder Squad. I gave him the manuscript because I wanted to know if I was making any glaring errors in the police procedural bits.

He came back to me recently and told me how much he enjoyed it. It was a good holiday read, he said - the sort of story he'd probably take to the beach to enjoy while relaxing in the sun. And he had no problem with any of my procedural scenes (except apparently they don't draw chalk lines around bodies anymore). He also didn't have a problem with my amateur sleuth taking advantage of the fact that one of the investigating police officers fancies her, and using that to get information about him about the case. My writing group critiquers had a problem with that. It's highly unethical for a police officer to have any kind of relationship with someone who should be a suspect, they said.

It might be unethical, but as my copper friend pointed out, policemen are as human as anyone else. They might well engage in unwise relationships with someone they encounter on a case. In fact, he'd come across such things happening in his career.

The strange thing is, encouraging comments from just one person who enjoyed the book have inspired me to finish it. And maybe the fact I no longer have my crit session notes is not such a bad thing. There's a balance to be had between ignoring all criticism and heeding every negative comment. Sometimes, you have to trust your instincts.  With the Shara books, the fact that I enjoy writing about her should be enough to keep me coming back to her.

And that small voice inside? That's the voice of self sabotage. That's the voice that tells me to listen to all the criticism. And I think maybe I need to learn to ignore her every once in a while.

Shara Summers will be back very soon. And if you haven't been introduced to her yet and are curious about my actress amateur sleuth, DEATH SCENE is available for the Kindle for a mere £2.59. American readers can find the US link here.

In the meantime, I am working on the fourth and hopefully the final draft of DEAD COOL. And you know what? It's not nearly as bad as I thought it was.

WIP Update - March 2013

Time for an update on current Works in Progress.

I've got several things going on at the moment. The most progressed WIP is the horror novel. It's been to beta readers, I've had feedback, and I have recently started work on Draft 4.

This novel, in summary, is about a group of live action roleplayers who unwittingly unleash a lich on the world during a game. Said lich wields powerful dark magic, and leaves death and destruction in its wake. And it sets about raising an army of zombies, as sort of a sub-plot. Anyway, on the whole the feedback was fairly positive. All my women beta readers love my main female character - she's a crack shot with a shot gun, she's ace with Resident Evil, she takes out many of the real-life zombies and she saves the boy.

There are some plot holes, and some characterisation issues, and these I am working to fix in the current draft. But I'm feeling pretty confident about this one. This one will be finished before the end of this year. In fact, I'm aiming to have it out on sub before 2014 dawns.

In the meantime, there's a second project - a collaboration with Hubby. Now, he's not a writer. But after more than 25 years of running D&D games, he's pretty good at plotting. And he's a musician. This new project is a crime thriller featuring a young female bass player, against the backdrop of the music scene in the late 1960s. We start her off at the Monterey Festival in 1967, and then bring her to London. This project is at an early stage. We've been doing a lot of the plotting together. And I have started doing some of the writing. But there's a long way to go yet, and since I've never collaborated with my life partner on a writing project before, it's somewhat uncharted territory.

And what of Shara 2? Well, that one's still languishing in a drawer. I got a bit discouraged after the crit session. Every time I get it out and review how much work there still is to do on it, I get depressed and put it away again. And DEATH SCENE has not exactly been flying off the cyber-shelves, so it's not as if I have a long queue of fans impatiently waiting for the further adventures of Shara Summers.

Nevertheless, she has one or two fans. And I would rather like to get this one finished. So perhaps I'll finish it for you. You know who you are.

This does make three WIPs on the go at once, however. And talking about them doesn't make them any closer to being finished. It's time to get back to the writing.

2012 Writing Goals in Review

It's time to revisit the writing goals I set for myself this time last year, and see how I did with them.

2012 has been a very good year, writing-wise. Not only did it seen publication of my first short story collection SOUL SCREAMS (and a launch at the BFS Open Night in June), but I also contributed to the anthology SIBLINGS, which was launched at FantasyCon. So two publications and two launches - not too shabby.

How did I do on the goals I set for myself last December? I wanted to finish DEAD COOL - the second book in the Shara Summers series - and get it out on submission. I failed dismally on this one. I had a critique session for this manuscript at the end of December 2012, and I got somewhat discouraged by the feedback. So much so, in fact, I haven't touched it since. But on reflection I'm not yet ready to abandon this manuscript. I enjoy writing about Shara, and I'd like to finish this book.

However, I have been more successful with the horror WIP, which I wanted to completed to beta reader stage. Ordinarily beta reader stage, for me, is draft 2. For this MS I've added an extra draft, but draft 3 is almost finished and I expect to have it out to beta readers early in the New Year.

My third goal was to step up promotion and increase sales of the published work. Well, I did my best to boost my internet presence, but it still feels like at this stage I'm a very small fish in a very large and crowded pond. Let's just say I'm still a long way from being able to give up the day job.

As for my goals for 2013, it may be being a tad ambitious, but I'd like to get both WIPs done. So these are my writing goals for 2013.

1. Complete DEAD COOL and have it out on submission by the end of the year.
2. Complete the horror WIP and have it out on submission by the end of the year.

I wish you a happy and successful 2013, and may you all reach your own writing goals, whatever they may be.

Imaginary Places

Location is crucial to a novel. For crime fiction, which is a very crowded market, it's almost as important as plot and characterisation. There's a serial killer loose? We need to know where. Is s/he pounding the streets of East End London, or moving among the movie star wannabes in Los Angeles? Swedish crime novels are the Hot New Thing at the moment, and I'm sure that part of the appeal is the Otherness of Sweden - a country that most people haven't visited, and its uniqueness - both in climate and the attitude of the population - make it a fascinating backdrop.

Of course, the location of a novel can only pull your readers in if it feels like a real place. If you're going to write about a real place, you need to convince readers who've actually been there. If I write about a real place in my stories, it's generally London, or parts of London that I know pretty well. But that's because I'm rather lazy about the research. If I have to set a story in a place I don't know very well, I'll create a fictitious place, rather than research a place I've never been to.

For SUFFER THE CHILDREN, I made up a fictitious town in Surrey, called Stanbridge. The town itself doesn't exist, but it's based on a combination of other Surrey towns, and I hope it comes across as a real place in the novel. For DEATH SCENE I used real-life locations - the book is set in and around London and Sutton. I wanted Shara to have a real-life grounding, a chronological time line in an actual place. It does mean that I have to be careful with location, as when you use a real place you have to respect the features that are actually there. If you throw in an abandoned warehouse on a street that actually exists and is exclusively a residential area, the residents might feel the need to correct you.

The current work in progress - the horror novel - is set partly in the Forest of Dean and partly in London. I don't know the Forest of Dean all that well, but it's a vast ancient forest and I don't think anyone knows every tree intimately.  However, it became necessary to take my characters to a town on the outskirts of the Forest of Dean. It had to be a small, old town.  Since I don't know the area all that well I thought I would just make up a town. After playing around with a few letter combinations the name Lydney came to mind, and seemed to work.

Earlier this week I discovered there actually is a town called Lydney - and it's a small town on the outskirts of the Forest of Dean. I found it while looking someone up on the database during the day job. One of my committee members actually lives there, so I suspect this knowledge had been lodged in my brain for a while, and my brain threw out this information when a request for the name of a town in the Forest of Dean came to light.

The only problem is, having never been to Lydney I have no idea if my Lydney bears any resemblance to the real life one. And because I really don't want irate Lydney townspeople writing me to protest what I'm doing to their town - and not just taking extreme liberties with the layout - I think I need to change the name. I'd far rather use a fictitious town. So I'm going to have to come up with another name for my fictional little town in the Forest of Dean.

I'd be interested to hear other writers' views on this. Do you prefer fictional locations for your settings, or real ones?